Empire, CO
How exposed is Empire to wildfire?
USFS scores Empire at the 94th national percentile for wildfire risk to structures (in USFS's highest wildfire-risk band nationally), a figure built from 224 real buildings rather than raw vegetation cover. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
USFS's separate burn-probability score — fire likelihood alone, before counting what's built there — puts Empire at the 91st percentile, close to its 94th-percentile risk score.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
USFS puts 61.2% of Empire's 224 buildings in the Indirect exposure zone, versus 38.8% Direct and 0% Minimal — a place where the fire doesn't need to reach the structure directly for embers to.
How Empire compares
There's little gap between Empire's 94th national percentile and its 82nd percentile inside Colorado, which means the state comparison mostly confirms what the national score already shows. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Empire ranks 1,946 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 23,973 by building count (1 is largest). Within Colorado alone, it ranks 86 of 472 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Colorado on its state page.
Shopping for coverage in Empire
At the 94th percentile nationally, Empire carries the very high rating that has pushed some carriers to limit new business in similarly-scored places elsewhere in the country. Worth comparing quotes rather than assuming last year's renewal terms still apply.
What would actually reduce this score
With ember exposure the dominant pattern in Empire (61.2% Indirect), vent screens and roofing material tend to matter more than lot clearing alone. The home-hardening guide covers both.
More on how this number was built
Empire's 94th-percentile score and its burn-probability figure both come from the same USFS workbook, documented in the methodology guide. For more on what indirect exposure implies beyond Empire, see the exposure-zones guide.